


The Multi-Colored Window, the Silver Apple and the Magic Penguin

by catness



Category: Fairy Tales and Related Fandoms
Genre: F/M, Funny, Geeky, Gen, Linux, Parody, Urban Fantasy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-15
Updated: 2013-05-15
Packaged: 2017-12-11 22:52:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/804152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catness/pseuds/catness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Loosely inspired by the tale "The Silver Plate and the Bi-coloured Apple" from The Fairytale Tarot by Baba Studio.</p>
    </blockquote>





	The Multi-Colored Window, the Silver Apple and the Magic Penguin

**Author's Note:**

> Loosely inspired by the tale "The Silver Plate and the Bi-coloured Apple" from The Fairytale Tarot by Baba Studio.

Once upon a time in a faraway kingdom there lived a farmer who had three daughters. The eldest two, Sue Ellen and Rhiannon, were well-liked in the village because they were pretty, chatty and knew how to behave themselves in any social situation. The youngest daughter, Debbie, was quiet, shy and weird to the point of creepy. She used to dress in baggy clothes of murky colors, she didn't care for dancing and shopping but spent all her free time in the basement playing with worms, spiders and other revolting creatures. Her father didn't paid much attention to her quirks, but her sisters always made fun of her and nicknamed her Dopey.

One day the farmer went on a business journey to another kingdom. He had to renew the license for his weed seeds, and for that, the Archdruid required his eyeprint on the contract parchment. Before leaving, he asked his daughters if they wanted any gifts from foreign lands.

"Yes!" yelled Sue Ellen. "I want a magic multi-colored window so I could watch all kinds of places and stuff through it and chat with my buddies without getting out of the house!" 

"All right, everything that could keep you home for a whole night ought to be good," said the farmer. "Consider it done. What about you, Nonnie, do you want one too?" 

"No way, Papa, every bum and his grandmother have a magic window these days," drawled Rhiannon and stubbed her lavender-scented cigarette in a ceramic teapot. "Bring me an enchanted silver apple on a crystal plate, so when I roll it around, I could listen to astral music and see fairies and angels playing in their gardens."

"Hmm, these enchanted apples cost quite a bit," said the farmer. "But what wouldn't I do for my child! And maybe you could learn something actually useful from those fairies." 

Then he turned to the youngest daughter who quietly sat in a corner, tearing wings off a moth. "And what gift should I buy for you, Debbie?"

"Don't buy me anything," said the girl, "but when you pass by a beach, just pick a little penguin for me."

"A penguin?" laughed the elder sisters. "What's it good for?"

"Really, Debbie," said the father, "if you want a pet, I can buy you a beautiful songbird, or a purebred dog, or perhaps a riding horse so you'd get out sometimes and breathe some fresh air. We're not that poor to make you handle a feral beast."

"Thank you, Dad, but I want nothing but a penguin," insisted the girl.

***

Time passed. On one dark and stormy night a griffin carriage stopped by the house. The roaring and flapping of immense wings awakened the daughters. They bounced into the living room just when the farmer trudged in, groaning under the weight of two bulky crates.

"At last! How come it took you so long?" scowled Sue Ellen, watching her father unpacking the first crate. "Put the magic window in my bedroom, and be extra careful with it, it's fragile - if it breaks, you'll have to get me another one!"

"Don't worry, Sue," said the father, wiping sweat from his forehead. "I'll fix it on your wall as soon as I unpack your sister's crate."

"But Papa, don't you dare to touch my silver apple and crystal plate with your dirty hands," said Rhiannon, "what if you spoil them? Go take a bath and cleanse your aura right now, and then you may unpack my gift. If I see a single stain on it, I'll never forgive you."

The door squeaked and a small penguin waddled into the room, leaving muddy paw prints on the floor.

"Eeek, get this dirty critter out of here!" screamed the elder sisters.

Debbie run to the penguin and hugged it, even though its feathers were dripping wet. "Thank you so much, Dad!" she said. "He is gorgeous!"

"What a dork," sneered Sue Ellen.

Rhiannon nodded. "Absolutely unenlightened."

But Debbie ignored them; she was already on her way to the basement, with her new pet in tow.

***

More time passed. Day by day, the elder sisters became less and less happy with their magic gifts. 

"My multi-colored window soaks dirt like a sponge," whined Sue Ellen as she sat on the front porch and sipped ale from a massive jug. "I scrub it with a dragon hair brush every morning till my hands hurt, and next day it's filthier than before! And it's swarming with leeches and roaches and all kinds of bugs, they escape through the cracks in the frame and crawl all over my room! It's just sick." She sneezed and loudly blew her nose.

"You've got it easy," said Rhiannon between the puffs of smoke from her ubiquitous cigarette. "At least you can do it on your own. My silver apple demands a golden coin whenever I touch it, look at it, breathe at it or even stay in the same room! My treasure chest is nearly empty, and Papa doesn't give me any more gold..." 

Sue Ellen snatched the cigarette out of her sister's hand, threw it on the floor and stomped it out. "I'm sick enough without this stench!"

"But they're organic, therefore healthy," argued Rhiannon. "Besides, if you collect 404 empty packs and send them to the headquarters of Fuddlespace Inc., you get a free invitation to the cave of the Book of Many Faces!"

"The Book of Many Faces?" gasped Sue Ellen. "But folks say it's evil and can devour you alive?"

"Nonsense," said Rhiannon, "it's nice and friendly to good smart people like us. It's only dangerous for freaks and psychos."

"Speaking about freaks," said Sue Ellen, "here she comes." 

Indeed, Debbie just walked through the gates, followed by her penguin. The bird had grown up and matured, now it was almost human-sized.

Debbie stopped in the middle of the yard and spoke to the penguin in a strange foreign language. In response, it started to conjure glowing bubbles out of the thin air. Within every bubble there was a lifelike picture of a beautiful exotic scene. There were castles and cathedrals, forest groves and blooming gardens, glass towers and giant metal birds crossing the sky.

The elder sisters froze with their mouths agape. They had never seen Debbie playing with her pet before, and it had never occurred to them that it was capable of anything but eating and sleeping.

"Come here," called Debbie, "my Nox doesn't bite!" She said something to the penguin, and it flapped its wings and out of nowhere produced a silver tray with three porcelain cups full of aromatic java, and a plate of hot fresh cookies. 

"Yuck, how dare you, I am on a diet," said Sue Ellen, grabbing a handful of cookies and stuffing them in her pockets.

"How mediocre, it's too sweet and doesn't taste organic," whined Rhiannon as she sipped her coffee. When she finished her cup, she reached for the remaining one.

"Mmmm hey Dope," said Sue Ellen, chewing on a cookie, "wanna trade? You give me that beast, and I'll give you, um, a permission to clean up my magic multi-colored window, and you can watch it all you want while you're cleaning it."

"No," protested Rhiannon, "give the beast to me and I'll let you roll my silver apple once every full moon, as long as you disinfect your hands and bring a chest of golden coins. Hey you," she snapped her fingers at the penguin, "follow me!"

The bird clicked its beak and lurched forward, aiming at her hand.

"Ouch!" Rhiannon jerked her hand away and wiped it with an antiseptic napkin.

"Sorry, it's not the way it works," said Debbie. "To talk to Nox, you have to learn the right words. And you have to care for him, feed him and treat him with love and respect." She ruffled the bird's black feathers, and it emitted a soft squeak. "He is my friend, I won't trade him for anything. But you can adopt your own for free, just like I did. You can raise them yourselves and teach them magic. I can explain it all if you want."

"To care for a dirty animal and teach it so it's weeks before you get anything out of it? Way too annoying, why bother?" said the sisters and retreated into the house.

***

Now as Sue Ellen and Rhiannon witnessed the penguin's tricks quite often, they got sick with envy. "This beast must belong to us," they thought, "Dopey doesn't deserve to have the best gift of all." But there was nothing they could do. Debbie wouldn't hear of giving her penguin away.

One day Rhiannon came home with a big smile on her face. "Look what I've got!" she exclaimed, waving a piece of pink parchment at her sister's face.

"A coupon for a bar of organic soap?" guessed Sue Ellen.

"No, much better - it's an invitation to appear on the cover of the Book of Many Faces!"

"Cool! Can I get one too?"

"Well, I've been asking around, and now I know for certain that the Book is full of evil magic, so we should stay clear of it. But we can use it to get rid of Dopey! She believes that she's the smartest cookie in the jar, she will fall for it."

 

Debbie was rather surprised when her sisters presented her with the invitation and even offered to accompany her on the perilous trip through the forest. She suspected that there was a catch. But she got curious. Besides, Rhiannon mentioned that the Book of Many Faces only accepts the seekers who demonstrate high intelligence, and Debbie couldn't resist the challenge.

Following the map sketched on the parchment, they arrived at the entrance into the mountain. A narrow stone corridor, faintly illuminated with blue candles, led downwards. Debbie went first, clasping the precious parchment in her hand. Her sisters trailed behind, ready to turn around and dash off any second. 

In the middle of the cave, amongst the cobwebs and splashes of blue light piercing the darkness, a giant book was floating in the air. Its thick cover looked fluid, and various faces appeared and disappeared on it like ripples on the water. There were men and women, kids and elders, even animals; laughing, crying, screaming, they surfaced for a moment only to be replaced with others.

The Book rustled its pages and a deep voice boomed: "Hello there, beautiful! How can I help you?"

"I'd like to try it out and see what's this new magic is all about," said Debbie. 

"Of course, of course! I live to share! Come closer, my lovely, so I can see your face and add it to my collection," roared the Book.

Suddenly Debbie felt uncertain and wished she had brought Nox with her. But the penguin was left at home, studying a new spell of making castles in the clouds.

"Don't be shy, sister," said Rhiannon. "If anyone deserves a close encounter with the Book of Many Faces, it's you!" She gave Debbie a sharp push on the back. The girl stumbled and tried to grab on a dangling cobweb to keep her balance.

The Book didn't let her fall. A long blue tongue sprang out from between the pages. With one flick, it wrapped itself around Debbie's neck and pulled her in. In a moment, she was gone, and only the wobbling cobweb was left behind as a reminder that she ever existed.

"Mmmm, yummy," said the Book and burped. "And what about you, lovely ladies? Would you like a touch of magic?" The blue tongue emerged again, coiling and uncoiling in the air.

"Thanks, sugar, perhaps some other time!" yelled Rhiannon, seizing Sue Ellen's hand and dragging her out of the cave.

***

Upon returning home, the sisters rushed to the basement, arguing who would be the first to play with the penguin. But it was fruitless. The bird viciously attacked them and refused to let them anywhere near it, no matter how they coaxed and threatened it.

Their father, alarmed by screaming and howling in the basement, demanded to know what's going on. "Dopey finally lost it," explained the sisters, "she ran off to the forest and disappeared. We're just trying to feed her bird so it won't starve."

"It's touching that you're so helpful," said the father, "even though you both hate animals. But I don't want you to do anything with Debbie's pet. I'm sure she'll be back soon, and if something happens to it, it will break her heart. I'll care for the penguin myself until she returns." He refused to listen to their pleading to give them another try, and locked the basement with a padlock.

 

***

Even more time passed. 

One day the King's gardener caught a twitter bird feeding on a blackberry bush, and was about to give it to his cat for lunch. But suddenly he realized that the bird's chirping was not the usual meaningless jumble of words and exclamations but a coherent text. It said:

"Help! I'm Debbie, my sisters tricked me to steal my penguin, I'm trapped by the Book of Many Faces & it's eating my brain! Destroy the book by..."

The gardener was astonished. He barraged the bird with questions. "Who's Debbie? What does she do with a penguin? What's a book of many faces? How to destroy it?" But the bird just repeated the same words over and over, because twitter birds have tiny brains and can't remember more than 140 characters.

The gardener decided to go ahead and take the bird to the King, figuring that if the curious message was of any importance, he would get a reward.

***

"It's not the first time I've heard rumors about that magic book," said the King. "I always thought it's harmless entertainment for the gullible, and the danger is greatly exaggerated. But entrapping my subjects without the official jail license? I believe that the book is evil and must be destroyed!" 

He summoned his best knights and ordered them to slash the Book of Many Faces into a billion pieces. Easier said than done! When the knights entered the cave and unsheathed their swords, the Book erected a wall of blazing fire around itself, so no one could even approach it, let alone pierce it with a sword or anything else. 

"Damn it Debbie, whoever you are," grumbled the King. "If you knew how to destroy the book, couldn't you phrase your message more concisely?" He fed the twitter bird a whole bowl of crunchy chips, hoping that they would boost its memory and make it remember the rest of the message, but the bird got bloated like a whale, squeaked "Over capacity!" and dropped dead.

The King's only son, prince Ian, appeared from the palace library with a coffee mug in one hand and a bejeweled tinderbox in the other hand. "Father, I understand you had finally authorized the termination of the Book of Many Faces?" he asked.

"Damn right I had, but the orders are impossible to carry out," lamented the King. "That horrible thing seems to be invincible!"

"No worries," said Ian, "I know exactly what to do about it." He straightened the duct-taped glasses on his nose and unlocked the tinderbox, revealing a ball of gray slime curled inside. "This is a worm I've bred and raised myself, and it's fully capable of destroying the book."

The King sneered. "You and your silly magic obsessions. What can such a tiny creature do where a squad of knights had failed?"

"Just come with me and watch it," said Ian. 

"I'll humor you this time," said the King, "but if it doesn't work, I'll personally ban you from the library, because it's improper for the King's heir to spend days and nights with his nose stuck in dusty books. Oh and I'll marry you off at the first possible opportunity, no more excuses, no more mocking the best prospective brides of the kingdom and calling them 'noobs', 'lamers' and 'lusers'!"

"And if it works?"

"I'll give you the master key to the library, and will never ever mention the words "girlfriend" and "marriage" in your presence."

"Deal!" said Ian, omitting the fact that he had managed to procure a copy of the master key quite a while ago, not as much out of necessity as out of curiosity.

***

Ian released the worm onto the cave floor. It crawled towards the wall of fire and halted, squirming, upon getting hit by a stray spark.

"Here we go," said the King, "your wretched chunk of slime is toast. Are you wearing white or black for the wedding?"

"Patience," said Ian. 

The worm writhed and squirmed until it split into two halves. Both of them began to grow, and soon there were two worms instead of one. Each of them split again. In a few minutes the cave was swarming with the sea of slime. The King shuddered in disgust while the young man gleefully rubbed his hands.

The worms rushed into the fire. Their bodies exploded and popped like fresh popcorn, but for each casualty there were two new attackers. Eventually the fire began to falter. The Book howled with pain as the worms climbed inside and began to devour it page by page.

One of the abandoned cobwebs in the corner quivered, and a transparent human body appeared among the threads, slowly condensing until it became opaque and solid. It was a middle-aged woman, disheveled and emaciated. She swayed on her feet, her red inflamed eyes with dark circles under them widened as she turned her head from side to side.

"Are you Debbie?" asked the King.

"No, dimwit, don't you see my name on my profile? I am..." her eyes darted around the cave walls. "Argh... I can't remember! What's going on? Where am I? Where is my wall, my pictures, my friends? Where is my farm, my bakery, my aquarium, my pokemons??" She sank on the floor and swayed, clutching her head in her hands and wailing.

"Obviously a lot of poor sods were trapped in there," said Ian. "The place is going to be crowded, we'd better go back and summon the team of healers and transportation."

***

The town buzzed and bustled, discussing the spectacular demise of the Book. Hospitals were full with malnutritioned, queasy and disoriented ex-prisoners in a need of rehabilitation; instead of enjoying the freedom and looking forward to be reunited with their families, they mourned their slavery in bewitched dungeons and blamed the rescuers for ruining their life.

When the flood of escapees almost terminated, Ian entered the cave again, to verify that all the worms self-destructed, because if they were allowed to roam freely, they could do more damage than the Book itself. He found the place empty, apart from a bunch of torn and charred pages scattered on the floor, and a girl standing in the corner. There was a worm in her hands, and she was poking at it with a pen knife.

"Drop it right away," shouted Ian, "it's dangerous!"

"Nah, I cut off the executable bit, so it won't do any harm," she replied. Ian realized that what she was holding was a headless and partially dissected body. "I'm examining its insides. Quite a brilliant piece of work, really. I wonder who bred it."

"I did," replied Ian with an involuntary grin. "Well, actually, together with my pet penguin Nix. I've taught her a lot of interesting magic spells."

"Oh no, my penguin!" cried the girl, dropping the worm's remnants. "I have to check on him, he's all alone at home, hope my pesky sisters did not mess him up in my absence!"

"Wait," said Ian. "Do you happen to be Debbie? The one who had sneaked a twitter bird through the Book's shields?"

"Yes, that's me," she said. "I tried to tell it that the Book could be only destroyed by a self-replicating worm, but it ran out of memory. Luckily, you've figured it out on your own."

Ian couldn't believe his ears. This girl was thinking on the same brainwave! "And you also have a penguin?" he asked.

"Yes, raised and taught him myself, can't stand those stupid silver apples and windows and whatever passes for magic here. Sorry, thanks for the rescue and all, but I'm in a hurry."

"No, wait," said Ian, stepping forward and blocking her way. "I've never met anyone like you before, how about we merge our distros? I so grok you; I'm sure my modules will compile perfectly with your kernel!"

"Well, I don't know, I have to parse it..."

"My sources are open, grep any file you want, there are no backdoors!"

Debbie pondered, examining the stranger. The young mage's broken glasses, pasty face and tangled mess of black hair looked irresistible, not to mention that he also had a penguin... For inspiration, she drew a red spiral sigil in the air.

"By mighty Thorvald and his flock of daemons, we meant to be together like zero and one!" exclaimed Ian. "Marry me, Debbie!"

"And the magic word?" she teased.

"Sudo marry me, Debbie!"

"Ah, all right. What's your username, by the way?"

"Ian."

"Ian? Ox49616E, my favorite RGB color? It's fate!"

***

The king was overjoyed that his son finally found someone to marry, even though she was a poor farm girl, and announced his decision to retire. Nox the penguin merrily waddled around the library together with Nix the penguin, while the young couple discussed the specs of their future project.

"We still haven't decided how to punish your sisters," said Ian. "Would you like them to be executed? Archived? Swapped out?"

"I'll let them live," said Debbie. "I've heard that the Royal Mail Department is understaffed. How about employing them to un-jinx the pigeons and clean up the crap from the cages?

"Cleaning up the Royal Mail? But it's much worse than death," said Ian, "you're really a mean bitch!"

"Awww, thank you!" She blushed.

"See, that's why I love you," said Ian, "you'll make a perfect sysadmin."

***

Debbie and Ian coded happily ever after, and released many upgrades. No one dared to call the queen "Dopey" under the threat of a permanent ban. From now on, she was known as The Admin.


End file.
